Evolution of a Breakfast, or Tales of the Breakfast Wars
So I'm eating breakfast and thinking about breakfast.
When I was in high school (after beckyfeld had graduated, so the morning commute was just Abba and me), I had a set routine: Get up at 5:30 AM, get dressed, do whatever last-minute homework stuff I'd left undone, and then get out to head to the T by 6:45. At some point, lcmlc noticed a missing component -- no breakfast. And she was not particularly pleased by this. However, I cannot eat real food for at least half an hour after I've woken up. So, after much back-and-forth, we hit on a solution: corn on the cob. She got frozen corn on the cob, I would microwave it and eat it before leaving for school, and then I'd have cereal and milk (sold by the Student Council starting in, I believe, my 10th grade year) during the breakfast period at school (between the end of Shacharit and first period).
This continued until I went to Israel. While I was in Jerusalem, I ate breakfast between my first and second classes (because, well, the dorm building had classrooms on the first floor, so it was not uncommon for my classmates and me to stumble out of bed, get tea or coffee, go to class in our pajamas, robes, and slippers (first class was always Hebrew language), then go back upstairs, shower and dress, go back downstairs for breakfast, and then go to our second class). On moshav and kibbutz, we ate with everyone else (on moshav with our host families and on kibbutz with our work group, whatever it was that day).
I went back to not eating breakfast when I got back to the States and started college. Breakfast, such that it was, was more often than not a 20-oz Mountain Dew and a pastry (yeah, I know. I was in college; that is my only excuse). After graduation, I lived with the parents for a year, so I went back to random-vegetable-for-breakfast before going to the bus to get to work.
When mabfan and I got married, I was working down the block from the main block of kosher stores in Brookline, so my usual pattern was to pick up a bagel on my way to work, and that would be breakfast. But then I started working in Cambridge, and while I tried to keep the bagel-for-breakfast pattern up, I kept missing my bus because it would pass the bakery while I was waiting for the cashier to finish ringing me up. I had to come up with a plan.
I started by bringing breakfast cereal to work, and I'd have a bowl of cereal (and a cup of coffee) every morning. Then, one Pesach that had a number of Chol HaMoed days that I was in the office (and, thus, had to figure out breakfast (kosher-for-Pesach cereal is not my idea of food)), I started having yogurt for breakfast. Once Pesach was over, I saw no reason to stop with the yogurt, so I was having cereal and yogurt. Then I added in a bottle of water to go with the coffee, and then just a couple of months ago, I added a banana to the cereal. So, yeah. I end up having approximately the same breakfast every work day, but, y'know? I'm not starving by lunch time, so I figure I'm doing something right.
When I was in high school (after beckyfeld had graduated, so the morning commute was just Abba and me), I had a set routine: Get up at 5:30 AM, get dressed, do whatever last-minute homework stuff I'd left undone, and then get out to head to the T by 6:45. At some point, lcmlc noticed a missing component -- no breakfast. And she was not particularly pleased by this. However, I cannot eat real food for at least half an hour after I've woken up. So, after much back-and-forth, we hit on a solution: corn on the cob. She got frozen corn on the cob, I would microwave it and eat it before leaving for school, and then I'd have cereal and milk (sold by the Student Council starting in, I believe, my 10th grade year) during the breakfast period at school (between the end of Shacharit and first period).
This continued until I went to Israel. While I was in Jerusalem, I ate breakfast between my first and second classes (because, well, the dorm building had classrooms on the first floor, so it was not uncommon for my classmates and me to stumble out of bed, get tea or coffee, go to class in our pajamas, robes, and slippers (first class was always Hebrew language), then go back upstairs, shower and dress, go back downstairs for breakfast, and then go to our second class). On moshav and kibbutz, we ate with everyone else (on moshav with our host families and on kibbutz with our work group, whatever it was that day).
I went back to not eating breakfast when I got back to the States and started college. Breakfast, such that it was, was more often than not a 20-oz Mountain Dew and a pastry (yeah, I know. I was in college; that is my only excuse). After graduation, I lived with the parents for a year, so I went back to random-vegetable-for-breakfast before going to the bus to get to work.
When mabfan and I got married, I was working down the block from the main block of kosher stores in Brookline, so my usual pattern was to pick up a bagel on my way to work, and that would be breakfast. But then I started working in Cambridge, and while I tried to keep the bagel-for-breakfast pattern up, I kept missing my bus because it would pass the bakery while I was waiting for the cashier to finish ringing me up. I had to come up with a plan.
I started by bringing breakfast cereal to work, and I'd have a bowl of cereal (and a cup of coffee) every morning. Then, one Pesach that had a number of Chol HaMoed days that I was in the office (and, thus, had to figure out breakfast (kosher-for-Pesach cereal is not my idea of food)), I started having yogurt for breakfast. Once Pesach was over, I saw no reason to stop with the yogurt, so I was having cereal and yogurt. Then I added in a bottle of water to go with the coffee, and then just a couple of months ago, I added a banana to the cereal. So, yeah. I end up having approximately the same breakfast every work day, but, y'know? I'm not starving by lunch time, so I figure I'm doing something right.